CHAPTER XXIX : THE BROWN SNAKES 



Small and Secretive Species, Representing the Genera STORE Rl A, 

 HALDEA, AMPH1ARDIS, and VIRGINIA 



SOME of the diminutive snakes included in this chapter 

 are probably degenerate descendants of the group of water 

 snakes. In adopting secretive and subterraneous habits they 

 have gradually lost the colours and size of the ancestral forms. 

 These serpents are readily recognised by the dull brown of the 

 upper surface, with but obscure markings or none whatever. 

 Their maximum length is about fourteen inches. They are 

 generally familiar as the little "ground snakes" so often found 

 hiding under flat stones or the bark of decaying trees. 



A key to the genera and species is given, together with 

 illustrations of the heads and sections of the body, for the species 

 are so alike in colouration that they are most easily told by their 

 scalation. 



The key follows: 



I. Body scales keeled. 



%l\o loreal plate. Genus Storeria. 



Brown above; pinkish beneath. 



DEKAY'S SNAKE, S. dekayi. 

 Brown above; vermilion beneath. 



STORER'S SNAKE, S. occipitomaculata. 

 \\A loreal plate. 



*Two internasal plates. Genus Ampbiardis. 



Brownish-olive above; abdomen white. 



CARMAN'S BROWN SNAKE, A. inornatus. 

 **One internasal plate. Genus Haldea. 



Brown above; pinkish beneath. 



BROWN SNAKE, H. striatula. 

 II. Body scales smooth. 



No preocular plate. Genus Virginia. 



Brown above; yellow beneath. 



Scales in fifteen rows. VALERIA'S SNAKE, V. Valeria. 



Brown above; yellow beneath. 



Scales in seventeen rows. VIRGINIA'S SNAKE, V. elegant. 



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